Abstract
Biological mechanisms that account for variations in individual g-factors range from brain size and density to the synchrony of neural activity and overall connectivity within the cortex. Researchers uncovered evidence for the molecular genetic background of music related phenotypes such as composing, improvising and arranging music. Creativity in music was found to co-segregate with a duplication covering glucose mutarotase gene at chromosome band 2p22, which influences serotonin release in the brain and membrane trafficking of the human serotonin transporter.
Direct your eye right inward, and you’ll find. A thousand regions in your mind.—Walden—Henry David Thoreau
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Notes
- 1.
According to Peter Carruthers, “there is a very great deal of evidence from across many different levels in biology to the effect that complex functional systems are built up out of assemblies of sub-components, and that this sort of modular organization is in fact a pre-requisite of evolvability. This is true for the operations of genes, of cells, of cellular assemblies, of whole organs, of organ assemblies (like the respiratory system), … it is appropriate to think of cognitive systems as biological ones, which have been subject to natural selection.”
- 2.
For those who wish to go deeper in the subject, Richard Haier’s Neuroscience of Intelligence is an excellent history and topical summary on genetics, DNA, and imaging of brain connectivity and function. Haier, R. Neuroscience of Intelligence, (2016), Cambridge University Press (freely downloadable at: https://archive.org/details/TheNeuroscienceOfIntelligence/page/n1
- 3.
The transcriptome is the set of all RNA molecules in one cell or a population of cells and unlike the genome, largely fixed for a given cell line (excluding mutations). The transcriptome also can vary with external environmental conditions.
- 4.
MRI scans of 1583 children showed that SNP plasticity relates to intelligence and cortical thickness.
- 5.
As to cortical convolutions, statistically significant positive correlations intelligence scores were positively associated with the degree of folding within the left temporo-occipital lobe, in the outermost section of the posterior cingulate gyrus (retrosplenial areas). See, Luders, E., et al. (2007). Mapping the relationship between cortical convolution and intelligence: effects of gender. Cerebral cortex (New York, NY: 1991), 18 (9), 2019–2026. https://doi.org/10.1093/cercor/bhm227.
- 6.
Genetic brain maps may reveal how genes determine individual differences, and may shed light on the heritability of cognitive diseases, as well as other brain function, such as linguistic skills. The National Institute of Mental Health has funded a multidisciplinary team of investigators across 15 research institutes, referred to as the PsychENCODE Consortium, to create an integrative atlas of the human brain by analyzing transcriptomic, epigenomic, and genomic data of postmortem adult and developing brains at both the tissue and single-cells, across 2000 samples.
- 7.
The synapse transfers electric activity (information) from one cell to another. The transfer takes place from nerve to nerve or nerve to muscle. The region between the pre-and postsynaptic membrane is 30–50 nanometers.
- 8.
Low dopamine also affects mental stasis.
- 9.
The Blue Brain, research initiative, aims to create a digital reconstruction of the brain by reverse-engineering mammalian brain circuitry. It was founded in May, 2005, by the Brain and Mind Institute of the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL).
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Carvalko Jr., J.R. (2020). Neurobiological Correlates. In: Conserving Humanity at the Dawn of Posthuman Technology. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-26407-9_12
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-26407-9_12
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